It took two years for the Lumiére brothers and their
cinematograph to make their way to Italy. A year later, the country had
produced a motion picture of its own and in 1911, just fifteen years after
Auguste and Louis had wowed crowds in Rome and Naples, Italy was home to the
first avant-garde movement in cinema (the Italian Futurism movement). In
1934, the government built a massive film studio, called Cinecittà – "Cinema
City." Italy’s love affair with cinema runs deep and stretches back. It is
an integral part of its cultural history.
And Italian cinema has been an important part of the
American Cinematheque’s history - although tonight was my first
experience. I stood at the top of a long red carpet feeling somewhat
underdressed - actors, screenwriters, directors and producers standing around
me smiling into flashbulbs. This tiny piece of America briefly invaded by the
Italian film industry - a stylish, handsome army here for the opening night
of Cinema Italian Style, 2015.
They had brought with them the country's 2015 Oscar
submission, Non Essere Cattivo (Don’t Be Bad); the last film by the
widely admired Claudio Caligari. There will be six other films shown
November 12-16, many of them introduced at the Egyptian and Aero theatres by
the people who made them, offering audiences a unique insight and introduction
into the world of Italian Cinema. And It’s no accident that so many of them are
in the city at this time; the American Cinematheque is thought of highly by
filmmakers in Italy, a fact touched upon by the Consulate General himself as he
praised the efforts of the organization for putting together a "rich and
exciting program of Italian film for the people of Los Angeles”.
The Consulate General talked not only about the artistic
significance of bringing new Italian cinema to the people of Hollywood,
but also the cultural and economic significance. Seeing Italy up on the big
screen, he argued, got people dreaming of the beautiful boot-shaped country,
with its wonderful food, picturesque fishing villages, and relics of its
ancient past. He ended his speech by acknowledging that it was "Cinema
Italian Style" which first introduced La Grande Bellezza (The Great
Beauty) to American audiences, and the 2013 Paolo Sorrentino film won in
the Best Foreign Language category at the
86th Academy Awards. The months following that screening were a
whirlwind that took the cast and crew all the way to the Dolby Theatre. It
was big moment for Italian cinema.
This year, Don’t Be Bad will be hoping history
repeats itself and if life were like a movie, then perhaps it
might. Don’t Be Bad is the final film by Claudio Caligari, a
filmmaker famous in Italy for the 1983 movie Amore Tossico (Toxic
Love), an uncompromising, non-prejudiced look at heroin addiction that won the
De Sica Award at
the 40th Venice International Film Festival and
catapulted Caligari to stardom. Don’t Be Bad has the filmmaker
returning to a familiar subject, this time the amphetamine craze of the 1990s.
The movie portrays the hopelessness of the working class in Ostia, a province
on the outskirts of Rome, and it’s anchored by the fine performances of its
lead actors, Luca Marinelli and Alessandro Borghi.
To end the beginning of Cinema Italian Style 2015, awards
were presented to Valeria Bruni Tedeschi and Valerio Mastandrea. Tedeschi’s
2013 film, Un Chateau en Italie (A Castle in Italy) was
nominated for the Palme d’Or. Audiences at this year’s Cinema Italian
Style can see her in Latin Lover, the Italian comedy-drama showing at
the Aero. The award was especially emotional for Mastandrea, a close friend of
Claudio Caligari and producer of Don’t Be Bad. He used his influence in
Italy to get the film made and he worked tirelessly in post-production to get
it finished. Valerio dedicated his award to the memory of Caligari.
By the time you read this, the festival will be over and
the Italians long gone. But next year they’ll be back, and we in this city will
carry on being spoiled by the rich, memorable, often beautiful films of Italian cinema.